


de Tréville

by thaeon



Category: The Musketeers, The Musketeers (2014)
Genre: Gen, an au idea spanning from an episode in s2, written after that episode in s2 so not canon compliant after that episode
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-09-05
Updated: 2015-09-05
Packaged: 2018-04-19 04:29:40
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,509
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4732835
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thaeon/pseuds/thaeon
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>set towards the end of season two's "An Ordinary Man."  a two-shot, more or less, but could be made into a series.</p>
<p>"Louis clicks his tongue and throws his hands across his fine clothes petulantly; they ruffle, the silk scratching when his arms come back to his sides.  'As I thought,' he says.  'You are dismissed, Captain Tréville, go now.'</p>
<p>He presses his hand, clutching his hat with no small amount of force, to his heart and bows his head.  Just as he turns on his heel to leave, with his Musketeers in his step, Louis adds, loudly, 'Permanently.'"</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Okay, so, confession time: I never actually got around to finishing Season 2 of The Musketeers, for various reasons. But I was incredibly inspired after "An Ordinary Man," and also I wanted to acknowledge Tréville had been getting the short-end of the stick for the entirety of what I'd watched of Season 2.
> 
> I never thought I'd post this but I really enjoyed the writing and was proud of it. You can take it as a prequel to a more complete story, if you want.
> 
> Please, please let me know if there's any spelling or grammar errors, because I'd like to fix them. Any reviews/constructive criticism is welcomed and encouraged. And, if you'd like me to continue, either leave some kudos, reviews, or drop me a message (anonymous or not, it's up to you) on tumblr; theonharlaw.tumblr.com.
> 
> Warnings for death, but no more than what's typical for the show.

"I'm a soldier," says d'Artagnan, with only the slightest ragged edge of a plea to his voice, "not an executioner."  Tréville has never been so proud of him.

Louis's face crumbles to one of anger, a surprised rage; it is the second time Tréville has seen one of his gifts, his "honours," thrown back into his face, and it goes no better than the first.  He looks to Tréville then, for an explanation.

Tréville keeps his eyes firmly on the wall across court; it is the way that he can keep apathetic, angered repressed at taunts, and unashamed at the reminders of his mistakes.   _You do not look royalty in the eyes, Jean-Armand_ , he had been told once.   _They look down on us already, they do not need to think you believe yourself their equal_.

It is Rochefort that kills the man, and the guards that drag away the body.  The floor is too polished for blood to leave a trail, but there droplets of blood left behind, red on the ground in front of the Musketeers' feet.

"A disappointment," says Louis.  At Tréville's earlier refusal, he has been tempered by the presence of the queen and the eager ears of the court; he is not so restricted now, and his voice raises until it echoes across the walls.  "Is that all you can give me, Captain Tréville?  Tell me, is it just in their nature to be disobedient to their king, or do you train them that way?"

He had not thought to tell the inseparables of the offer given to him, he had refused it so suddenly, after all, that there would never have been a need to, but if they were ignorant to the tension between their captain and the King of France then they are no longer.

"Well?" prompts Louis, this is a question demanding of an answer in his eyes.  "Is it their behaviour, or yours?"

"Mine, of course, sire," he says.

Louis clicks his tongue and throws his hands across his fine clothes petulantly; they ruffle, the silk scratching when his arms come back to his sides.  "As I thought," he says.  "You are dismissed, Captain Tréville, go now."

He presses his hand, clutching his hat with no small amount of force, to his heart and bows his head.  Just as he turns on his heel to leave, with his Musketeers in his step, Louis adds, loudly, "Permanently."

He freezes in his place, but manages to turn his head to look over his shoulder.

"Excuse me, sire?" asks Athos, for Tréville has no heart to speak.  "Permanently?"

"Yes."  His mouth twitches, as it does when he makes an impulsive decision.  "Captain Tréville is dismissed, permanently."  He looks to Rochefort, who has been whispering in his ears - or else the queen's, since his arrival - and then nods once to himself.  "As of now," he adds needlessly.

"Of course, sire," says Tréville, though his tone is slow in his mouth and the words feel vile.

He is a strong man, capable of much force, but unstrapping the pauldron from his arm takes more strength than he thought capable.  He closes the distance between himself and the king, bows his head again, and offers it to him.  Dismissed from the guard, but they will not say that Jean-Armand de Peyner died for pride.

Louis's hands are no longer cakes with dirt and grime, but cleanly washed and pink, and the pauldron, although always clean and kept in good condition - more so than any other belonging Tréville owns - looks dirty in his hands.

"Go now," orders Louis, and Tréville follows his orders; he is in no mind to argue against the most powerful man in France.

Jean-Armand de Peyner would not die for pride, but certainly d'Artagnan would, for a moment later he hears the unclipping of another pauldron, one only just earned.  He turns his head just to see d'Artagnan's drop to the ground, not even placed in his king's hand.

"What is the meaning of this?" Louis splutters; he is prone to impulsive action, but doesn't well receive it.

"If I am a disappointment to the Musketeers, then I would not wish to shame their name," he says, though his teeth sound clenched.   _Foolish boy_ , Tréville thinks blindly, yet fondly.

"I am afraid I have also been dismissed," says Athos, voice wistful but not regretful, and with Athos will always follow--

"Apologies, sire," says Aramis, at the same moment Porthos says gruffly, "Sorry."

Three more pauldrons join d'Artagnan's on the floor, atop the blood.  That is where their names will go; Tréville will be remembered as a captain, perhaps as a friend, but Athos, Porthos, Aramis, d'Artagnan . . . they will be remembered as deserters.

"Captain Tréville," says Louis, "command them to take their issue back!"

"I cannot, sire," he says, and if he were any younger, any more like one of his four Musketeers, he would say it with his tongue in his cheek, "I am no longer captain of the Musketeers; I have been dismissed."

Louis splutters once more, but the guards make to open the door for Tréville's escape, so he leaves with his friends at his back.  When they have left the courtroom, and through the front gates of the palace with only their blue coats and hats left about them, he whirls on them, Athos first for he's the oldest and the leader of mischief.

"What is it you think you're doing?!" he says, and though he tries to hush his voice from anger, he knows that it rises.

Athos does not react to his scold with anything more than the lightest of smirks, looking vaguely proud of himself.  He smiles more, Tréville has noticed (he is not alone in that regard; Aramis had looked entirely grim and grey after his return to Savoy, and Porthos had reacted to every word directed his way with violence because all that had ever been spoken to him was a sneer or slur; all of that had been Before), and he is glad for it, glad for the  _trois mousquetaires_ , and their fourth, their d'Artagnan.

Thinking on it, he wheels to face the youngest of their group.  "And you?!" he asks.  "You had only just earned your commission!"

d'Artagnan's face lets slip only the slightest of regret.  "Yes," he says, "About that . . . do you think that I could stay with one of your for a small time?  Only that my commission was my income."

_Foolish, foolish boy_ , Tréville thinks, but when he turns again, the other three are holding back sniggers.

"What's so funny?" he demands of them, and it sets Porthos loose into laughter, and Aramis immediately after.  Athos has the decency to reign in his features, though his lips twitch entirely too often for him to disguise it as anything other than mirth.  He almost laughs himself, but instead forces them to keep walking through Paris itself; they will have to reclaim their belongings from the garrison, but after that . . .

"Would we all stay in  _la maison de Tréville_?" asks Aramis suddenly, with a playful glint in his eye, and Tréville almost speeds his pace to leave them behind.

Instead he says, "Yes," and feels the others almost trip in their steps.

"What?" asks Athos, and the humour is gone from his voice and curiosity its replacement.

"My home is large enough," he says.  "I could accommodate you all.  The commission was not d'Artagnan's sole income alone, was it?  Where else would you go?  Would you expect Porthos to return to the  _Cour des Miracles_?"

Porthos ducks his head.  He does not make an issue of "home," but without the garrison, it would be his next option, and Tréville knows it well.  "Sir," he begins.

"I am not your captain any longer," he says, though it burns him to relieve himself of those responsibilities, of the responsibility of these grown children, and of the authority he is granted.  "I am just a man, the same as you, and you are my . . ."   _sons, children, nephews, responsibilities_ , "friends."

They are silent for a moment, struck by his words, and he is proud to have them caught off-guard, but it is quick silver-tongued Aramis that cannot leave the silence be.

"Does this mean we can call you  _tu_?" he enquires jovially.

"Don't push it."


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The ride to Tréville.

"It's not necessary," says Athos, as he has been saying since they set for Tréville.  It will not be far, and the land is Tréville's by right, besides, as comte, left unattended for the most part; he will have more time for it now, with no guard to manage.

_It's not necessary_ , Athos says, and yet he has not dismounted from his horse or turned them back to Paris as of yet.

"And where would you go otherwise, Athos?" he asks.

"I--"  He swallows thickly.

"Your house burnt to the ground," Porthos says clearly, though there's no malice in his voice.  "You'd make your bed in a pile of ashes if we'd let you."

"Which we aren't," Aramis reminds him.

d'Artagnan is notably silent.  All of his Musketeers feel shamed to rely on him for their upkeep; they feel they are a burden.  Clever Aramis has already talked them from their paranoid thoughts; he may not like being taken from Paris and to Tréville's manor in the countryside, to live from another's kindness, but he is the most clear-sighted of them all at times, and he understands what decision is the right to take.

"What brought you to Paris, then, Captain?" asks Porthos.  He has not yet called Tréville by his forename or his surname, only by his title, and it looks as if it'll be a habit hard to drop, but Tréville does not berate him for it.  "If your home is so far from"--he looks across the fields and snorts--" _anything_."

"The first son is the heir, the second a spare," he says lightly, and he does not miss Athos's twitch.  d'Artagnan was a single child, Porthos raised with other orphan children in the streets, Aramis brought up with the fraternal camaraderie of soldiers; but Athos--Athos had a brother, and had confessed to Tréville about him when he was young and had first joined the garrison, unused to the familiarity of congenial relationship amongst the Musketeers.  "My brother was to inherit our lands, and I was to honour my father's name; of course, they did not account that my brother would elope with his bride, and leave me the heir."

"You had a brother," says d'Artagnan, "what was his name?"

He tries not to sound so sharp when he says, "It doesn't matter so much now.  I have not seen him in a great many years; when I first went to Paris."  He almost laughs.  "My father expected me back at first light when he sent the letter to me, detailing that I was to return to and take my brother's place, but I--I had been a young man in the Musketeers then, and I would not drop my place so soon after my commission."

d'Artagnan's face falls a little then, but self-righteousness is a gift this boy possesses, that and a will to defend himself.  "You saw him!" he says.  "I thought that he had learned something after--but he acted like a child so soon afterwards!"

"And you challenged him for it," Tréville notes, "so who is the bigger child?"

"Now, now," Aramis says, and rides between them both.  "d'Artagnan's childish actions were ruled by his morals, the King's by his . . . mind, I suppose."

"The King is taller," adds Porthos, from Tréville's other side, "so I would say that makes him the bigger child."

"Both of you," Tréville sighs, "such troublemakers."

"I would say that the dauphin is the biggest child of them all," says the wry Athos, and Tréville considers throwing himself from his horse just at that.

Instead, he catches Aramis's wistful look.

"What is it, Aramis?" he says.  "Why did Athos's words sober you?"

"Oh, Aramis," Athos sighs, "you are not still thinking of the dauphin, are you?"

"Why is Aramis thinking of the dauphin at all?" asks Porthos, and d'Artagnan's confusion matches Tréville's.

Aramis flushes at that, and has the right to look sheepish.  "Perhaps we will talk about it another time," he says, and he sends a sharp look over his shoulder to Athos.

Athos translates the look as if it were a verbal comment.  "I would not disapprove of your actions if they were not  _treasonous_ ," he says, and he looks to Tréville; he is every part a child informing his father of his brother's mischief.

"Treason which you need not concern yourself with for much longer," the latter informs them all quickly.  "It was a danger at court, perhaps, but we are no longer there."

"We do not have to be at court for Rochefort's spies to hear our words."

"Tell me," Tréville demands.  "Aramis, you committed treason?"

"And you told Athos but not me?" adds Porthos.  His face is stony from betrayal.

"I did not tell him!" Aramis defends himself.

"Believe me, my friend," says Athos dryly to their third, "if I had a choice in the matter, I would not want to know."

"I would not wish to make any other complicit," Aramis continues.

"I did not wish to be complicit," mutters Athos to himself.

"You spend so much time in our company, in Porthos's," says d'Artagnan, "they will suspect we are already complicit just for being your friend, Aramis; you may as well tell us the truth."

Aramis takes a long look across the countryside, in search of listening ears, but there is no one across the moors.  Still, he brings his horse very close to Tréville, Porthos, and d'Artagnan.  His voice is a mere whisper.  "I had . . . a moment with the Queen, you could say."

Tréville understands immediately, and one of his hands leaves the reigns to catch Aramis's arm.  Were they walking, he would surely take him by the ear to his office at the garrison, but they are not walking nor in Paris nor welcome in the garrison any longer; so many things have changed.  "You mean to tell me that--?"

"His skin is not as dark as my own," says Aramis in his own defence.  "It is pink, not olive, like the King's."

"Or like the Queen's," suggests Porthos darkly.

"It was a moment of weakness!"

"Every moment in the company of women is a moment of weakness for you, Henry d'Aramitz," Tréville scolds.

d'Artagnan sniggers so suddenly that it takes the rest of them aback.  "I'm sorry," he apologises.  "Only that . . . is that your name?  Henry d'Aramitz?"

Aramis blows air into his cheeks and has the decency once more to look flustered.  "Yes, well, they say your name is  _Charles_."

d'Artagnan falls into a sulking silence, and soon the rest follow him.  It is a long few minutes before Porthos finally asks, "Really?  The Queen?"

Aramis hits him so hard in the arm that he almost topples from his horse.


End file.
